It’s on 4 July and it’s going to be massive! What more do you need to know? Ok, ok keep reading… It’s going to be a long night of amazing acts and the best bit is it’s going to be a complete bargain! Dance Island 2009 is offering us, the raving public, fifty plus artists from as little as £42.50! First of all the headliners: Pendulum (DJ set), Chicane (live), and Utah Saints roll to Cambridge as the heavy hitters for this all nighter. Pendulum, I imagine, will be bringing us their established brand of dramatic drum and bass that seems to send us all berserk! Personally I will be looking forward to this set in the hope of some remixes from the ‘In Silico’ album that us not so hardcore Drum ‘n’ Bass heads wont yet have heard. Chicane will be popping down to East Anglia to deliver something considerably more relaxed than Pendulum, but hey there’s nothing wrong with a bit of contrast.

Chicane will be tugging at surrealism with the ambient trance that has made them such a seminal act of this genre. If you fancy seriously loosing yourself in the music and floating around on an ocean of gentle beats and soothing synths this will definitely be the act for you. Finally for the headliners is the popular Utah Saints, who will be dropping some retro sounding dance that will put a smile on your face and a beat in your heels.

Although the headliners for this event are good there’s so much more! Unfortunately I don’t have nearly enough space to discuss them all so I am going give you a low down on what I feel are going to be the ones to catch. The first I would like to call to your attention to is Kutski. This radio one resident is sure to play it hard and dirty with some big beats and throbbing hard style bass lines to keep you stacking through the night, definitely worth a look. If you’re of a similar age and disposition to me you will remember Yomanda’s ‘Synth and Strings’ being one of the first dance songs that just made you want to jump about like a loon. If this is the case then you will be happy to hear Yomanda will be playing dance island this year, all for your bouncing pleasure - grab the glow sticks for this one! If you like it hard then check out LAB4, live this act is honestly not to be missed. The hard trance duo have been producing ’out there’ music for more then 10 years now and the experience shines through in so many respects. In a word, it will be stomping!

Finally I am going to mention the outstanding Hardcore being smashed out this year. With so many sets to choose from, which ones to see? Well personally I recommend two in particular. First off there is Sy B2B Dougal, which I expect to be wholly uplifting and euphoric. This is a massive set that doesn’t come along every weekend people! Of course the other set for any hardcore head to make sure they catch will be DJ Gammer. Recently winning DJ of the year this one will be a blinder full of brilliantly produced music. So will I be seeing you lot at Dance Island 2009… ye?… that’s what I thought ;-)

www.dance-island.co.uk  

Words > Matthew Sokanovic
Photos > Vince Pettit